1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process and system for real-time monitoring of a data processing system for its administration and maintenance support in the operating phase, which data processing system communicates in the client/server mode through interconnected networks, each client comprising a browser which supports a high-level hypertext language.
2. Related Art
Generally, a distributed management environment makes it possible to integrate the administration of systems, networks and user applications, the dialogue between the various machines of the system and/or between the various users being organized around requests and responses to these requests, the most common requests in a network being related to access to files or access to data. An application is said to be designed according to a "client/server" architecture when it is composed of two independent programs which cooperate with one another to carry out the same operation, each of which runs in its own environment (machine, operating system), while a programming interface using a language constituted by commands makes it possible to control their dialogue. The client/server mode has the advantage of allowing a user (for example of a simple microcomputer) called a client to consign part of his task or some of his operations to be executed to a server. In this way, the client has a greater computing capacity at his disposal than that of his microcomputer. Likewise, a client can address a specialized server and effectively outsource an operation, the server being under optimum conditions in terms of implementation and expertise by virtue of its specialization. In this context, up to the present time, providing real-time monitoring of a data processing system for its administration and maintenance support in the operating phase has involved the development of a specific application for each client, which represents a considerable drawback since, first of all, a technological choice of this type is very costly and prohibits simple upgrading since a modification, an addition or a new development inevitably requires a modification, an addition or a new development for each specific application.
Faced with this technical problem without any effective solution, a second fundamentally different approach, may be envisaged: developing a generic client application and only upgrading the server. Once this technical problem was presented differently, a solution was created by observing systems operating in interconnected networks and by applying this technique analogously to the administrative applications. In effect, the dialogue of all "client/server" entities can be established through one or more networks which can be interconnected (Internet, for example), in which case TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) is the most commonly used protocol. These networks constitute a veritable world-wide "web" (as it is commonly referred to by one skilled in the art), making it possible to connect multimedia servers to one another and forming the equivalent of an immense hypertext multimedia document which is described using high-level hypertext languages such as, for example, the language HTML (HyperText Markup Language), the communications between the users (clients) and the servers being provided by the protocol HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol). A hypertext language like HTML defines the logical organization of the information, particularly with hypertext links (between texts, images, sounds, video sequences) for the development of content at the level of the server but not its formatting (that is, its organization into pages), which is handled by the client's software. A client in this context is equipped with a navigator (called a "browser" by one skilled in the art) used for browsing and scanning the information organized into pages offered by the various servers. However, these pages constructed by the servers are static, which also presents a substantial drawback when it is desirable to provide real-time monitoring of an administrative system in the operating phase. In effect, for efficient utilization, the evolution of the system over time (states of the machines, malfunctions, etc.) must be accessible and quickly known, and the pages constructed must not be presented in static form, but in a dynamically evolving form. Moreover, another drawback is apparent from the simple fact that the operation of a machine requires a minimum intervention and knowledge of its environment, and if a problem arises, it is necessary to establish a diagnosis, thus demonstrating a certain technical expertise, in order to rapidly discover the existence and then the source of the problem and to make a correction or possibly repair this machine, which is not necessarily the prerogative of the average user.